Slash Gordan

Murs and Fashawn seems like such a natural fit, it’s almost contrived. However, the story of their mutual appreciation of each other as artists makes a lot of sense. For Fashawn, growing up in central California, he was obviously enthralled with the Living Legends crew and of course one of its more formidable members, Murs. As far as Murs is concerned, I believe teaming up with Fashawn is a great power play, he has an extremely strong network in the industry but could use a younger artist to cop some quick shine from the whippersnappers, this union should be reciprocally beneficial. Needless to say, I’m pumped about this seemingly intuitive fit. The duo have made the album This Generation, due for release September 25^th 2012 through Duck Down Music Inc. The album is produced in its entirety by Beatnick and K-Salaam and has been described by Murs as “an amalgamation of all the different styles and eras”. The duo will tour with Rock The Bells this year, check out that Paid Dues stage for more on the line up.

Murs Slices Through Whole Wheat Bread [Update]

Talk about a Living Legend still doing it, Murs has been steady building. Yes, there are the multiple solo projects that he has pushed recently, including last years album Love & Rockets, Volume 1: The Transformation and this years Yumiko: Curse Of The Merch Girl which featured the best Kickstarter campaign I have ever seen implemented. However, he has also built up quite the reputation as a serious player in the promotion and booking world as well. He also recently curated Through The Mic, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art’s first-ever hip-hop concert series, and this year’s installment of his annual Paid Dues festival. Mur’s commitment to going the extra mile often reaps the benefit of networking with apparently random yet fittingly compatible projects like this six track album with Florida punk rock band Whole Wheat Bread. I don’t know much about the punk rock scene, but they work it out with the NorCal rapper on the following track.

Together they are called The Invincibles, my prediction, this is a one off project. It’s free, however, the link they provided to us bloggers does not work, unlike other sites I’ll just go ahead and tell you that rather than post a dead link for you to then hate me and/or Mur’s PR people for later. I will be sure to update this post with the link when it surfaces again.

Here’s that link, his PR people are actually pretty on top of things. 
http://www.audiomack.com/album/murs/murs-whole-wheat-bread-are-the-invincibles

Verbs Is Busy Swimming

People who live in Los Angeles are very familiar with the phenomenon of classic “LA” figures that stand out for whatever eclectic reason and exist as a landmark within the city. Whether it’s that jogging guy in Silverlake (whom I believe passed somewhat recently) or the guy in the suit selling pies at Crenshaw and Jefferson during rush hour, there is an essence about the city that is punctuated by its characters. For Angelinos who listen to hip hop and care about the local artistry, an emcee by the name of Verbs is pretty hard to miss. He’s one of those guys who you will see everywhere, literally. Identified by his trademark red stocking cap and his denim vest with a plethora of pins, you can catch the man riding his bike around Leimert, or attending pretty much every event of note in the music scene, the man gets around. Well, apparently he’s able to sneak out of the city and get some work in after sharing the stage and performing with his crew The Swim Team at Paid Dues Music Festival 2012, VerBS released his single from his forthcoming The Progress EP 3: Manifest Awesome. This song contains samples of Janelle Monae, Mayer Hawthrone, Electronic composition by KnockSteady’s very own Duke Westlake. Next time you see the man, give the man a pat on his back for his efforts, maybe a bottle of water too, drink more.

VerBS – Happiness (prod. Duke Westlake)

Also check out a very “Verbsesque” video featuring visuals by VerBS Shot by the good dudes at Original Knockoff.